In today’s world, people expect things to be delivered quickly, efficiently, and hassle-free. This presents a challenge for transport and delivery companies, who must find ways to increase their speed of service without raising costs. One way to do this is to focus on delivery route optimisation.
Organisations need to find a way to analyse the distance, duration and cost of a journey quickly and accurately to determine the best route. Route planning software can help find the most efficient route possible.
What Is Route Planning?
Route planning is finding the best route for a trip, considering factors such as time, cost, and multiple stops. This is usually done with a piece of software or an online platform that companies can customise to their individual needs. The software calculates the duration of the journey and the transport costs involved. Based on this data, the tool generates the most efficient route plan.
How Does Route Planning Benefit SMEs?
The objectives and benefits of route planning software are to help users plan the most efficient route possible between two or more points. This can save time and money by assisting users in avoiding traffic congestion, road closures, and other potential delays. Route planning can help companies to minimise the number of kilometres travelled and delivery times and ultimately increase their productivity and profits.
Route planning tools can help companies plan the best route for their employees to take when making deliveries. This can help free up employees for other tasks, as they will not have to worry about planning the route themselves. The tool is helpful for service providers who want to be more productive and efficient when managing many vehicles. The tool can help you plan routes and distribute tasks more effectively.
Intelligent route planning provides customers with greater satisfaction by more accurately calculating delivery times and communicating more precise estimated time of arrival (ETAs). In addition, customers have increased control and reassurance as they can track their orders, receive regular notifications about the status of their orders, and ultimately receive their products and services on time.
What Are the Main Functions of Route Planning Software
Route planning tools integrate the following functionalities:
- Task Assignments, or finding the best route for a given task and then assigning that task to the best-suited individual.
- Vehicle Tracking, or the feature that lets you see the location of your vehicles in real-time on a map. This helps keep track of your fleet and can be used to dispatch vehicles to new locations or track their progress on delivery.
- Delivery Management, or the management of deliveries, includes the delivery status, the proof of delivery receipt, and the quantities delivered.
- Access to Customer Information or a way to track customer information and orders. This can include basic contact information, order history, and tracking information. In some cases, the software may also provide instant notifications to customers or staff about changes in their order status.
- Time Recording, or a system of recording when people or vehicles arrive at and depart from a certain location. This can be used for things like security or traffic purposes.
- Route Updates, or how the Google Maps app for Android provides a real-time map and route updates. The app will automatically update the map as you move and provide turn-by-turn directions based on your current location.
- Team Communication, or the ability to communicate with team members and customers, is a key part of any business. Having a good communication system allows businesses to keep everyone updated on what is going on and provide a way to get in touch with anyone who may need assistance.
- Activity Reports Analysis, or searching activity reports and analysing the data to find patterns.
- Navigation, or a feature on some smartphones and other devices, allows the user to input a destination and verbally receive turn-by-turn directions.
- Feedback, or being able to receive feedback, comments and ratings from my passengers constantly. This feedback helps me to improve my service and keep my passengers happy.
Conclusion
Small and medium-sized businesses should consider using delivery route optimisation to improve their efficiency and bottom line. This software can help businesses save time and money by planning the most efficient delivery routes possible. Additionally, delivery route optimisation can help businesses keep track of their deliveries, ensuring that each delivery is made on time and to the correct address.
At SolBox, you can grow and scale your logistics business easily and effectively with our route optimisation, digital delivery and driver safety check solutions. Improve workflow, remove inefficiencies, and intelligently allocate resources to reduce your cost to serve with our fast and flexible technology solutions. If you’re looking for route optimisation software in Australia, we’ve got you covered! Get in touch with us today and let us know how we can help!
